Thursday, November 5, 2009

Of course you know, this means war...

Oh i just love this. Adobe has apparently decided to let iPhone users where the real blame lies in the fact that they can't run Flash apps on their device:

My guess is that most disgruntled iPhone users (such as myself) were already aware that the fault lies with Apple, but Adobe is now clarifying for the masses. Adobe is clearly champing at the bit to make Flash available for iPhone users like you and me, so why won't Apple allow it?

(diatribe begins here.)

Easy: Money. SURPRISE! Flash opens up a whole new way for application developers to get their software onto your iPhone--without having to go through the iPhone App Store. Combine that with Apple's unwillingness to loosen its iron grip on control of everything that goes onto your phone, and you end up with the current situation.

To be fair, the iPhone wouldn't be anywhere near as popular as it is now without the app store, and the App Store wouldn't be as popular as it is now if Apple let every Tom, Dick, and Harry upload their crappy, bug-ridden software for you to download and crash your phone with.

Still, it all seems a little too parental to me. It's MY phone. Let me put what I want on it, and given the number of Flash-dependent websites out there (after all, 98 plus percent of desktops already have Flash installed. Apple actually had to stop airing an ad in the UK claiming “All the parts of the internet are on the iPhone=” because the lack of Flash and Java support were enough to get the ad yanked), it shouldn't be too surprising that I want Flash! So open up your email client and let Apple know they should get on the ball on this one. Or maybe better yet, write to Adobe and tell them you love their new error message!